M.T. Pocketts is no longer Abroad!

Yep, have been back for almost a week...but that doesn't mean I've been doing much of anything!  Kind of nice to take a little vacation after my vacation! haha! I took hundreds (yes, literally hundreds) of photos, of which I'm slowly making my way through.  I'll share a few of them over the next few posts. First off....

LONDON

I'm assuming most people pretty much know what scenes of London look like, right?  This was not my first trip to London (I am very, very lucky), nor will it be my last, God willing! We took a little day trip south of London intending to find Hever Castle. ... got a bit lost and literally ended up in a cow pasture!  We thought about our friends picturing us glamorously cavorting about Piccadilly Circus, Trafalgar Square and such. Nope!--COW PASTURE!

Where now, brown cow?!

We kept following path after path, zig after zag...

Stay on the paths between the pastures!

We also stumbled across nice, little, unassuming English cottages.  For some reason, we got the feeling they weren't thrilled to see us! Hmmm....nevermind.

We finally did make it to the castle.... Aside from being saved by the Astors in the early 20th Century, the claim to fame of Hever Castle is that it is the childhood home of one Miss Anne Bolelyn. 

Here I am, standing on the moat.  Yes, there's a moat! It is a Castle afterall!

Every decent castle has to have a nice courtyard:

They told us Anne looked out these windows. Well, duh!

Apparently Edward Scissorhands had recently visited the castle, too.  I'm so sorry we missed him!

For our Midwestern friends!

Lastly, I will leave you with a photo from our hotel in London, which we christened "The Bed and Chair." It will provide a lovely segway for our next Bed and Chair....

Lovely, yes?! And so cozy, comfy, too!

They say you can't go back to Constantinople....

Hmmm....I'll just have to go to Istanbul!

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Really, I'm not kidding! I said I had a lot on my plate this week.... let's just say a week ago I had no plans to be getting on a plane this Friday and going to London for a few days, before jetting off to Istanbul! And later, Bulgaria, Romania, Serbia, Croatia & Hungary. I'm still pinching myself! I'll let you know how it goes.

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I wanna hang a map of the world in my house. Then I'm gonna put pins into all the locations that I've traveled to. But first, I'm gonna have to travel to the top two corners of the map so it won't fall down.

Mitch Hedberg

American comedian (1968 - 2005)

Au revoir!

Projects Projects Projects!

Since our return from California we've been busy finishing up some projects that we've been intending to complete for some time now! Like, say, 6 or 7 years perhaps?  In the case of the antique stained glass window in our library, it has been that long! *blush*  It was installed in a hurry (I don't remember why) and the frame was never stained and varnished to match the woodwork around it.  You know how you can get used to things and start "not seeing" the flaws?... the window is so pretty, we stopped noticing the frame entirely!  So it sat there, and it sat there.....

Voilà! One stained and varnished window frame which, not surprisingly, looks a whole lot better that way!  Magically, it makes the glass look better, too! Who knew?!

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And yet another project is completed: The highchair!  This was a Goodwill purchase for a couple bucks....originally I was going to remove the paint and have it be a wood-grain finish.  However, it was just too scarred and messed up.  There comes a time when you have to admit defeat and go to Plan B.  That would be paint!  I'm not a fan of paint--I've saved some beautiful antique pieces from "antique green" oblivion, to reveal awesome quarter-sawn oak beneath.  The transformation would convince most to shy away from paint stores forever!  But this time.... Paints have definitely improved--I found some lovely black (made by Rustoleum called "American Accents") that leaves it a satin-like, Colonial-style finish.  They had several shades: dark green, dark red, creamy white, slate blue; but I decided a basic black would work wherever I decided to put it.

Before (well, During.... I had removed at least 3 layers of paint in blue, white and yellow):

After:

The Fleur-de-lis was an afterthought.  I just love it!
Since I don't have any small people in the house, it might end up being a plant stand.  We shall see.

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And remember the fern stand from last year?  (Of course you don't, but here's a reminder!) That, too, proved to be a mess underneath its god-awful brown porch paint.  I had so hoped it was a lovely oak (it's very heavy!), but instead, it looked to be several pieces of mahogany glued together before being lathed.  Not a good look for actually seeing the wood!  

So....it got the black paint treatment as well! And it's done!


Now I just need a big Boston fern and I'll be set!

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Some stitchery has also been completed.  There's another more complicated one that's getting tantalizingly close to being done, but I did this one in the meantime for a change of pace!  Approximately 8x10, it was a quickie & fun to do.

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All in all, when I'm done with all of that, I prefer to be doing this....Cheers!

I just love summer!

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Ok, gotta go---I've got a lot on my plate this week.  Just you wait and see!